Jessica Tuchman Mathews, Director, and Chair

Jessica is a distinguished fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. She served as Carnegie’s president for 18 years. Before her appointment in 1997, her career included posts in both the executive and legislative branches of government, in management and research in the nonprofit arena, and in journalism and science policy. She has served as a trustee of leading national and international nonprofits, including Harvard University, the Nuclear Threat Initiative, Radcliffe College, the Rockefeller Foundation and the Century Foundation, the Brookings Institution, among others. She has published widely in print media and foreign policy and scientific journals and has co-authored and co-edited three books. She lives in Marshall.

Robert B. Dale III, Director and Treasurer

Bob is a longtime Middleburg resident and the former executive director of Windy Hill Foundation, a local nonprofit that works to provide safe, decent, and affordable housing to low and lower-income individuals, families, older adults, and adults with disabilities in Fauquier and Loudoun Counties. He is a retired CPA and a former partner at the accounting firm of Yount & Hyde Barbour. Bob has served on the boards of the Windy Hill Foundation, Piedmont Child Development Center, Middleburg Community Center, Wakefield School, the vestry of Trinity Episcopal Church (Upperville), the Loudoun County Commission on Aging and currently serves on the Town of Middleburg Strategic Finance Committee.  

Henry F. Atherton, III, Director

Harry Atherton graduated with a history degree from Harvard University in 1967 and subsequently served two years in the United States Army from 1968–1970. He was stationed in Vietnam for one year. After returning home from his service, he pursued his Juris Doctorate from the Columbus School of Law, which he earned in 1974. In addition to practicing law, Harry was a full-time farmer from 1977 until 2018. He represented the Marshall District on the Fauquier County Planning Commission from 1981 to 2000 and on the Board of Supervisors from 2000 to 2008. He was a trustee of the Virginia Outdoors Foundation from 2007–2011 and on the Middleburg Bank Board of Directors from 2007–2019. 

Landon Butler, Director

In 1981, Landon Butler co-founded the Multi-Employer Property Trust, a large commercial real estate commingled fund, and he served as President of the investor relations firm Landon Butler and Company until his retirement in 2010. He is a long-time Board member of the Shakespeare Theatre Company in Washington, DC, and served as its Chair for ten years. He is also on the Boards of The National Sporting Library and Museum and of Integrity Initiatives International. From 1977–1981, he served as Deputy Chief of Staff in the Carter Administration, where he facilitated communications across a broad array of administration-wide task forces. He and his wife, Carol, are retired on a farm near Rectortown, Virginia. He is a graduate of Washington & Lee University and Harvard Business School and served as an officer in the US Marine Corps.

Mark Ohrstrom, Director

A resident of Fauquier County, Mark joined the board in May 2020. Mark is the President of Larkspur Management, an investment and finance company. He has served in the U.S. Army and had a career in investment management and finance. Mark serves on boards of corporations, universities, and foundations, including The Piedmont Foundation and the Piedmont Environmental Council, EARTH University in Costa Rica, and Shenandoah University.

Alex Orfinger, Director

Alex Orfinger is a resident of Fauquier County.  He serves as the long-time publisher of the Washington Business Journal, the primary source for local business news and intelligence in the greater Washington region.  He serves as one of the managers of the Fauquier and Prince Williams Times.  In addition to his role on the board of the Piedmont Journalism Foundation, he currently serves as board chair of Jubilee Housing which provides deeply affordable housing in Washington DC, and is the chair-elect of Leadership Greater Washington, the region’s premier leadership incubator.

Conway Porter, Director

Conway Porter is a lifelong resident of Fauquier County who attended Rosenwald Elementary, William C. Taylor, High School, and later, Howard University, receiving a BA in Mathematics. He retired from the Virginia Employment Commission and currently serves as an Adjunct Instructor at Laurel Ridge Community College in Warrenton.

He serves as a Deacon of his church and on the Board of Directors of the church association. Conway has recently been elected to the office of President of the Fauquier NAACP.

He enjoys music and has played in various Gospel and Blues groups in the area. Porter and his wife, Miriam Hall, live in Warrenton and have 3 children and 9 grandchildren.

Trevor Potter, Director

Trevor Potter is a longtime resident of Fauquier County. His professional career has largely been in Washington DC, where his government service as a lawyer has included the Department of Justice, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Commissioner and Chairman of the Federal Election Commission. In private practice, he served as General Counsel of John McCain’s two Presidential campaigns, and was a drafter of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law. He is currently President of the Campaign Legal Center (CLC), a national nonpartisan non-profit organization focused on improving American democracy through law. He was part of the group of local citizens who purchased the Fauquier and Prince William Times newspapers in 2016 year to preserve their community service in the face of severe business challenges for local papers and was on the board of those newspapers through their purchase by Piedmont Journalism Foundation in the 2019 year.

Dana Priest, Director

Dana Priest is a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist at The Washington Post where she has worked on national security issues for more than three decades. She is also the John S. and James L. Knight Chair in Public Affairs Journalism at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism, University of Maryland. Dana is a contributor to PBS Frontline and has authored two best-selling, award-winning books: Top Secret America: The Rise of the Security State, Little, Brown & Co. 2011, and The Mission: Waging War and Keeping Peace with America’s Military, W.W. Norton, 2003. She has lived in Fauquier for the past decade, where she enjoys gardening, hiking, riding, exploring unknown roads, and all other things Mother Nature offers.

Anthony F. Shop, Director

Anthony Shop believes in the power of people-centered branding and marketing to create a bright future. He is the Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Social Driver, a digital services firm that helps companies and non-profits establish winning strategies with social media, websites, creative, and advertising. Under his leadership, Social Driver has received dozens of awards, including the #1 LGBTQ-owned Business in the World. He is also Chairman of the National Digital Roundtable, the premier convener of digital innovators, leaders, and policy shapers. Anthony has been recognized as Business Leader of the Year by the DC Chamber of Commerce, an “OUTstanding LGBT Role Model” by The Financial Times, and “40 Under 40” by The Washington Business Journal. A former newspaper reporter, Anthony was the first new media professional elected to the National Press Club’s Board of Governors. As an Eisenhower Fellow, he conducted a comparative analysis of digital media in China, which was presented at various universities and professional groups. Anthony currently serves on the board of Leadership Greater Washington and the Public Affairs Council. He earned his MBA from The George Washington University School of Business, where he teaches as an adjunct lecturer.

Pete Smith, Director

Pete Smith, a Warrenton resident, is the founder of SmithPilot Inc., a firm that provides consulting services to nonprofit organizations, and the former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Watson Wyatt Worldwide (now Willis Towers Watson), a major international financial and human resources consulting firm. He has served as a director or trustee of many nonprofit and for-profit organizations, including the Foothills Forum, a Rappahannock County nonprofit that focuses on strengthening local journalism.